In My Eyes
by jayhogartismyangel
Summary: After overhearing something that Reese said,KC needs Clare's reassurance.


**In My Eyes**

KC Guthrie walked into the locker room,pulling the sweaty tee-shirt over his head. Basketball practice had been hard today. His muscles were aching and sweat was dripping off of him. But he'd be seeing his girlfriend,Clare soon and that was all that mattered. He smiled at the thought as he headed torwards the showers. That was when he heard it. Reese talking to his friend Caleb about Clare and his relationship.

"I'm telling you. If she knew half the things he's done---other than steal a car---she'd be terrified." Reese was saying with a laugh as he tightened a towel around his waist.

KC pressed himself flat against the wall,frozen in that spot as he listened in. He felt a knot in his chest as he wondered if that was true. If Clare knew _everything_ would she be scared of him? Would she look at him with terror in her pretty blue eyes? Those dark thoughts scared the hell out of him. He didn't want to lose Clare. She'd become the most important person in his life.

In his own eyes,he hated the things he'd done and if he were her,he'd be scared. After all,almost beating another kid to death,the drugs,the alcohol,the girls,the stealing the car. All those things were things that Clare had never experienced. Things she'd probably known nothing about. It wasn't that he thought Clare wanted him to be a saint--it was more the terror he felt of her learning how impossibly imperfect he truly was.

------

That's what brought him here. Just outside her home,looking up torward her bedroom window,throwing pebbles to catch her attention. He needed to tell her everything,needed to know if there was any truth to Reese's words.

"KC?" She asked as she opened her bedroom window and stared down at him. Her hair was falling around her shoulders messily as she stared at him. "KC,what are you doing here?" She sounded puzzled as she awaited her boyfriend of three weeks' answer.

"Can you come down here?" His voice was strained as he said those words. "I need to talk to you."

Clare tilted her head to the side then nodded,shutting her window,she grabbed her blue,butterfly robe off the door and put it on over her boy shorts and spaghetti strap top pajamas. She slipped her feet into a pair of slippers and slowly walked out the door and down the stairs.

When she came out the front door,shutting it behind her she looked at KC carefully. He looked on edge. His eyes downcast,hands stuffed in pockets. His feet shuffling. She walked up to him. "What is it?" She asked him softly. Why do you look so upset?" Her hand went to his cheek,leveling his eyes on her. They looked tormented and that scared her. What was wrong?

"I need to tell you something!" KC said in a rush.

"This late? KC,couldn't it have waited until tomorrow? I mean...it's eleven." Her voice held a tone of admonishment in it.

"No. Clare....if I don't tell you now----I'll lose my nerve." He told her,pleading with her to hear him out.

Clare could only nod,feeling puzzled about it. What could he possibly want to tell her?

"It's about my past before Degrassi." He said,swallowing hard and squeezing his eyes shut as he sat on the porch steps with her. He put his head in his hands. "I need to tell you what all I did."

She stared at him,urging him to go on with her eyes.

KC let out a huff of breath and continued. "You already know about the car. But I've done so much worse than stealing a car. I----I almost killed a kid." He stopped then,waiting for Clare to process that.

Clare let out a gasp of shock. She knew there was more to KC Guthrie than she'd usually thought,but _this_? It was shocking! "What do you mean you almost killed a kid?" She asked in a mere whisper. Voice so soft,he had to strain to hear it.

He let out a shaky breath and ran a hand through his hair. "It was...at my old school. I got into a fight with this boy---a little older than me. He told the teachers that my friends and I were doing drugs and drinking on school property. Got me a weeks worth of detention. I confronted him in the school yard and----punched him. Then----" He sucked in a breath and squeezed his eyes shut,unwilling to see her face and what might be on it. "When he was---down on the ground,I....I started kicking him. He started spitting up blood. He had to be rushed to the hospital. I never forgave myself for it. You know? My callousness. The fact that I did something so--so inhuman." He looked up then,green eyes filled to the brim with tears,red and swollen.

"What happened to the boy?" She asked.

"He had some...internal bleeding and a few fractured ribs. He recovered but.....just barely." KC told her,voice choked up with sobs.

Clare put a hesitant hand on his shoulder,rubbing gently but she avoided his eyes. This was alot to process.

"Reese was right." He said quietly from beside her. Staring at her profile,shame faced. "You are scared of me now that you are aware of what I am capable of."

Clare's eyes narrowed suspiciously. "**WAIT!!!** **WHAT??** Reese was right about _what _exactly?" She asked,raising her voice a pitch higher.

He stared into her blue,heaven like eyes and said,"In the locker room today,Reese was talking to his friend Caleb. Saying how if you knew what I did....you'd see me as a monster. He laughed about it. And he was right." He sounded like he'd lost something so important. Those words were empty now.

"KC."

A hand on his chest. Another on his face,tilting it torward her. "KC....what you did a year ago doesn't determine who you are now. You've changed. Your a good guy who made a bad mistake that he regrets. I don't expect you to be perfect. I don't expect you to be any more or less than you already are." She flushed red as she said this and pushed a wild tangle of hair behind her ear at the sappiness of what she had said. Alli was so getting to her with her romantasizing.

He looked at her then. "Your too good for me. I don't deserve you. And yet...I'm lucky enough to have you. And Clare...none of the girls I was with before can ever compare to you. Your the real thing. Your amazing. And I couldn't ask for better." With those final words he threaded his hand through her knotted hair and pressed his lips to hers. He wasn't perfect. Far from it. But somehow...somehow he had gained Clare's trust and love and he couldn't thank god more.

**The End**


End file.
